Ethereum Faces Retail Selling Despite $84.4M ETF Buying. What Comes Next for ETH?
Ethereum ($ETH) is opening the week with a market that cannot quite agree with itself. Spot ETH ETFs brought in $84.4 million last week, their first net weekly inflow in nine weeks. Retail traders, meanwhile, have been selling into the move. Why does this matter? Because ETH is sitting near $1,800, and around that level even a modest push can start moving the tape faster than people expect.
ETH has barely moved over the past day. Up 1.1%, trading near $1,800, still holding double digit gains over the past 30 days. Looks calm. It is not that clean. My take: this is the kind of setup that looks boring right until positioning starts to matter. I would not call it panic, but I would not call it healthy either.
The ETF picture is better than it has been in weeks, although I would be careful with the victory lap. SoSoValue reported $84.4 million in net buying by the end of Friday’s session. That was the first positive weekly print after nine straight weeks without one. The week had only one red day: July 9, when investors sold $52.08 million as ETH slipped to $1,748. Most bullish reads will stop there. That is only half right. One good week does not erase the recent trend, but it does change the mood a bit, especially after nine weeks of weak ETF demand. Institutions that had been backing away are putting money into spot U.S. Ethereum ETFs again. If that demand holds, it could keep ETH from sliding too far in the short term.
Retail traders do not look convinced. Over the past 24 hours, selling volume has picked up in Ethereum perpetuals, and the Long/Short Ratio has dropped to 0.946. Below 1 means shorts have the edge. Simple as that. The pressure is clearest on OKX and Bybit, where CoinGlass tags whale positioning as “extremely bearish.” OKX has $4.10 billion in total perpetual trading volume. Bybit has $1.19 billion. In our view, that venue split matters more than the headline ratio alone, because large traders leaning short on exchanges that size can weigh on ETH even while ETF buyers add spot exposure.
Some traders are already pressing the downside hard. One trader opened a $12.43 million ETH short, which is not exactly subtle. I’ll be honest: that kind of size can look smart for about ten minutes, then become the trade everyone is watching. The liquidation data makes it look risky too. Shorts lost $11.49 million over the period, compared with $8.30 million for longs. So yes, retail is leaning bearish. Counter to the usual advice, though, bearish positioning is not automatically bearish for price. If ETF buying keeps putting a floor under ETH, those shorts could get squeezed quickly. Crypto does this all the time: the obvious trade gets crowded. Then liquidity goes hunting.
What this means
Ethereum is in a tense spot, not at some huge turning point. The $84.4 million ETF inflow shows that larger buyers are willing to return after weeks of caution. That could support ETH near $1,800, especially if retail selling stays heavy but fails to break the level. Is this a clean bullish reversal? No. For now, the market looks more like a fight between spot ETF demand and short positioning in perpetuals.
The next few days should make the picture clearer, and this is where I would avoid overcomplicating it. SoSoValue’s ETF flow data will show whether last week’s $84.4 million was the start of a real return or just a one week bounce. CoinGlass is worth watching too, especially the Long/Short Ratio. A move back above 1 would suggest retail sentiment is improving. For price, $1,748 is the support level to watch after the July 9 selloff. Resistance sits around $1,850 to $1,900. Yes, this sounds a little too neat after all that messy positioning, but the levels are still the levels. If ETH breaks cleanly on either side, that direction probably carries into the end of the month.